The Death Chart

Discovering the importance of transcending your birth chart

A while back a dear friend of mine who is about to face the death of a loved one asked me a philosophical question about Astrology. She wondered if, once the soul has passed on, whether the birth chart lives on in the afterlife and can be a way to see what that person's soul is up to on the other side.

I was instantly absorbed in thought over this. On the one hand, isn't it fascinating to consider that we can use the birth chart and a study of transits to predict what the soul might be doing after death?

I mean, I wanted to say yes, that I did think it was possible. It seemed like a good way to soothe her impending grief and offer comfort.

But the more I thought about it, the more a "yes" answer didn't sit right. First of all, let me be perfectly clear. I am an astrologer who believes in a higher power as well as reincarnation. I don't believe that we are only here once and that the physical person we are now is the only physical being we ever have been or ever will be. I do, however, know with every fiber of my being that the soul never dies. So where does that leave the birth chart?

The blueprint of the soul

If a horoscope is, what I like to call "the blueprint of the soul," then it shouldn't die with the body right? Hmm ... not so fast.

I feel strongly that your birth chart is the blueprint of your soul but in the sense that it will offer a snapshot about lessons your soul chose to tackle for this lifetime. In other words, our birth chart symbolizes specific characteristics we decide, pre life, to take on in human form this time around. This will include karmic lessons, talents and personal weaknesses, with the idea that, if properly utilized and learned from, we can then transcend them. Put simply the birth chart is a symbol of what type of growth our soul signed up to attain in THIS lifetime. As a result, it isn't the "end all be all" of our soul, but rather a portrait of what our soul will focus on learning while we're here in this specific body.

When I do live lectures about Astrology I sometimes take a physical birth chart in my hands and show it to the crowd. Then, at the end of my presentation, I'll ask the audience what they think the point of studying Astrology is. After I hear their answers I offer my own in a dramatic way. I declare loud and clear that I believe the point of studying your birth chart is to someday move onto the other side and transcend it. Then, I make a loud spectacle of ripping the chart in half.

Life after life?

It honestly doesn't make much logical sense to me that the birth chart will continue to live on in the afterlife and be accessible as a tool to check up on our loved one. Besides, when the soul decides to reincarnate, he or she will obviously have a completely different birth chart. Who is to say when one chart ends and the other begins? We just don't know!

True, an argument can be made that the date, time of death and location a person was at when they passed can become the death chart and that this chart can be followed. But why drive yourself this crazy? I think this type of thinking takes the focus away from the point of studying Astrology in the first place. We're not here to figure out all the answers about the greater meaning of life and how we fit into that mystery. We're here to ask the questions. We're here to live, learn, love and grow. We're here to open our soul up to a human experience. When we're no longer contained in a body we'll soon enough find out the answers to those major questions.

All we can do while we're here on Earth is to speculate about these great obscurities. If you're grieving over the loss of a loved one I think it's far more comforting to remember and honor the memory of who they were while they were here than try to figure out what they're up to now.